The Cane Creek Double Barrel supershock is available now on all 224-Evolution, Alpine 160 and Blood models.

The Cane Creek Double Barrel is one of those few components that causes a genuine stir in the mountain bike world. It hasn’t been hit hard with marketing or hype, it’s quietly come onto the scene and blown everything else out of the water. That’s how it works on the bike too, no crazy graphics or showy dials, it quietly gets on with annihilating the trail and every other shock you’ve ever ridden.

The key to the success of the Double Barrel shock is Öhlins’ Twin Tube technology. This system pumps oil through a continuous circuit allowing full control of both rebound and compression movements. Circulating the oil through the valving instead of the main piston allows independent remote adjustment not possible on other shocks. External adjustment eradicates the need for expensive custom tunes and allows easy setup according to track or weather conditions. You no longer need a factory race truck to revalve your shock, you can do it yourself. Öhlins might have made a name for themselves in motorsport, but along with Cane Creek their technology has revolutionised mountain bike suspension setup.

So why upgrade your Orange to the Cane Creek Double Barrel? True versatility. It “seemingly knows what terrain you are riding over and deals with it in stealth mode” (2010 Dirt 100). The movement is stiction free creating a limitless feel to the travel allowing the damping complete control of the shock and creating unbreakable traction on the trail. If you ride flats and continually bounce off the pedals, the Double Barrel will give you more control and let you hit stutter bumps without the fear. “This is one of, if not THE best piece of mountain bike equipment you can buy. It’s impossible to put into words how good this shock is” (Dirt #87).

The Double Barrel is the only upgrade you can buy to push even more out of your Orange frame, only you know if you need that sort of performance…

Spring rates:
We offer three options per model. These have taken into consideration rider weight distribution and preload based on approximately 30% sag at two collar turns.

Availability and pricing:
The Cane Creek Double Barrel is available as an upgrade on all 224-Evolution, Alpine 160 and Blood models.

‘i know for a fact that bike shops, cane creek, orange, and extra (the cane creek importer) are not really making much money out of the double barrel.’

If that’s the case how come everybody who sells Double Barrels online sells them for 10% less than RRP, where as most online retailers sell RP23’s for the RRP.

If all shops are willing to knock 10% the RRP of a CCDB then they must buy them for at least 20% less than RRP. Therefore Orange will be buying CCDB for £480 (I’d hazard a guess they pay less than that). So that means that if Orange are charging £400 extra for a CCDB over a RP23 then they must get RP23’s for £80 or less.

I don’t think it’s fair that Orange should make any money, they should sell everything at a loss and run the company into the ground, making all the staff redundant, like most other British manufacturing companies have done.
Phil

i am sure one would be great on an Alpine 160 or Blood, but on deciding to go a cheaper route i swopped an air can off my Patriot for a cheapo RS Vivid 5.1 coil from CRC at a fraction of the cost of the CCDB, and the change was still fantastic

The frames are not cheap since every-one in the UK wants to get paid a lot. Source the same from far east and it would cost x% less due to labour….it’s not rocket science. I am happy to pay a bit more for a UK designed, and built product. Also if those CC are made by Ohlins in Sweden again expensive labour.

The weather meant I couldn’t really put the hammer down but below are my first impressions:

– low speed damping meant almost no bobbing on the climbs whilst staying sensitive for the same bumps (plus you don’t have to remember to flick a Pro-pedal lever when you come to the downs.)

– super controlled in and out of compressions, my RP23 Boost valve used to blow through the travel on the way in (forever catching a pedal) then buckaroo me off the saddle on the way out.

– braking traction was superb, on the rough rocky chutes it never let go on the back, despite the snow

– landing drops felt really smooth which does wonders for the confidence

– I hardly lost the chain at all, which was a real bug bear when the Fox was fitted. It seemed to bounce off at the slightest provocation, but it would seem the suspension is that controlled it’s not a problem anymore.

Lastly, and this is a negative, it showed up the limitations of the fork (a Fox 32 Vanailla QR15), what the CCDB cruised through the fork took a bit of a battering.

Need to do more tweaking to see if it can be improved but first impressions are fantastic.